


of course they went to get him

by DestinyFreeReally



Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: F/M, post S1, pre S2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-05
Updated: 2017-06-06
Packaged: 2018-11-09 14:19:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11106333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DestinyFreeReally/pseuds/DestinyFreeReally
Summary: another imagined prison-break, where Wynonna uses her head and Dolls uses his heart





	1. ...six weeks later

    Six weeks. With his thumbnail, Dolls made the tally mark on the concrete wall behind his bed that meant six  _ weeks _ he’d been in a concrete box.  _ The penalty for treason is death, _ he’d almost-joked once, right? That felt like forever ago. Forever and six weeks ago.    
  
    He’d gotten used to it, the pain of the withdrawals, the blackouts, the tests he couldn’t stop. The interrogations that turned him violent until they subdued him with the promise of  _ more,  _ that was really just one or two drops; still more than the nothing he got most days.    
  
    When he let himself think of her, of her coming for him, it wasn’t about him at all. It was Wynonna’s compulsion to kick authority in it’s teeth, and her need to cling to things that shouldn’t have ever been hers.  _ Bullshit,  _ he hissed at himself through his own teeth, her coming for him wouldn’t mean anything; it would mean everything.    
  
    But six weeks, six achingly long weeks, and all of Mercado’s perfectly white chiclet-like teeth remained in her mouth. All of them smiling her mocking smile, daring him to do something distinctly Wynonna-like. The thought loomed, of course, that it was taking her so long to get to him because she was already dead. Because Purgatory was now the barren piece of scorched earth he’d threatened it’d be, and she’d done something horrifically brave like stayed there and tried to stop the inevitable.   
  
    Dolls didn’t have to push the thought away, it went on it’s own, chased by another. Wynonna only ever called him  _ Deputy Marshall Dolls _ to make fun of him, that still made him roll his eyes. People had called him Dolls before. People who were uneasy around him, looking to replace his rigidity with casual chatter.  _ Dolls.  _ Now she could never call him Deputy Marshall. Stripped of his position, Dolls initially tried to take stock of what he had left; and in the bare walls of the prison cell, body wracked with pain and anger, Wynonna’s mocking voice in his head was about all that stayed with him through the worst episodes.    
  
     Stirring him from a half-dream, alarms blared through his cell, through the whole facility. After six weeks of waiting for a sign, Dolls knew it when he heard it. 


	2. Almost Free

     _Shit._ _This isn’t going to work,_ Wynonna thought. Doc triggered the alarm, all according to plan, but Wynonna found herself out of position; she hadn’t expected Doc to start the fire _quite_ so soon.   _Even a few more seconds,_ she shook her head. After all, Dolls had been waiting long enough. She only had the vaguest clue and hope that he was even still alive after this long.  
  
    She’d never been the law; she’d _tried_ to be, for him, and because at first he black-mailed her, she’d really tried. But picking the lock on the door to the maintenance staircase, Wynonna bit her lip at the realization that sometimes the law were the bad guys, too.  
  
    From their research ( _fine,_ Waverly’s research, once they’d, you know… exorcised her) Dolls was probably down the stairs, in a concrete-basement-turned-cell probably surrounded by guardsmen. With any luck, some of them were called away by Doc’s fire-and-run, and the rest… well, she was supposed to handle the rest.  
  
    Taking the steps down quietly, Wynonna didn’t want to have to hear Dolls’ shit if she got caught and arrested herself. She listened, through the fire alarms, while the guards debated who stayed with the prisoners, who checked the fire, and which one of them would be the unlucky son of a bitch who had to tell Mercado that there was a disturbance on the compound.  
  
    Ducking into the next corridor, Wynonna held her breath as guards strode further down the hall away from her, the next part of the plan had a certain simplicity to it; _find Dolls._ Eyeing the guard left patrolling the basement, Wynonna weighed her options. Take him out now, and risk him blowing her cover, or take him out later and risk him blowing her cover.  
  
    “Hey there, I seem to be lost?” Wynonna left her hiding place, getting the guards’ attention and keeping an eye out for Dolls. “I was sent to bring Deputy Marshall Dolls in for questioning with the Bleeker case.” _Too much detail_ , she warned herself, thinking back to meeting Dolls in Purgatory with his whole Men-in-Black secretive shit schtick.  
  
    “ _Deputy Marshall_ ,” The guard laughed. “Nobody here with _that_ title.”  
  
    The man’s face got more punchable by the second, and Wynonna figured she wouldn’t have too much time alone with the guard.  
  
    “Xavier Dolls. I know he’s here. I have my orders, sir.” Wynonna’s tone warned, and she wondered if the guard could _smell_ how hard she was bullshitting. She’d never been the law, but she’d seen it up close, she could play act it, she figured.  
  
    “The only orders I’m waiting on for _Xavier Dolls_ are when I get to put him down.” The man reached for the radio on his hip, and Wynonna pulled Peacemaker on him, freezing the moment.  
  
    “Hard way it is, then,” She sighed. Naturally. _Naturally_ the whole thing would be the hard way. “So, you work security for a black-site compound. I bet the pay’s just shit,” Wynonna kept her gun on the man, who’d gone still. “Are you willing to take a bullet for your bullshit assignment? You know, _a_ bullet or.. several.”  
  
   The guard didn’t scare, but he didn’t move.  
  
    “Put down your gun and I promise I’ll only aim non-lethally. You’d be surprised how many squishy parts of your body can take a bullet. It’ll hurt like hell, yeah, but you’ll probably live. C’mon, now,” Wynonna instructed, her nerves about done playing Sheriff. She was already way off script, she wanted to keep moving.  
  
    Easing his gun down to the floor, the man held up his hands in surrender.  
  
    “Okay, now your radio. Just unclip it from your belt, _there_ you go,” She still had her gun on him, but she felt her breath come a little easier.  
  
    “You’re nuts if you think you’re gonna get away with this.” The guard spit at her feet.  
  
    “Yeah, well.” Pulling a detonator from her back pocket, Wynonna brandished it with a smile. “Do you have keys to Xavier Dolls’ cell?” When the guard shook his head, Wynonna sing-songed, “Well, then I’d start _running.”_  
  
    “Dolls? _Dolls?_ ” Wynonna called, feeling more sure of herself with the guard taken care of. Letting him go felt risky, but after all, _batshit, right?_ “Dolls!”  
  
    Through the bars, Wynonna saw a man huddled in on himself with his back to her, “Dolls?”  
  
    “Wynonna?” He called, but it wasn’t the man in the cell. Behind her, Dolls stood, bloody, clothes torn, with one of his eyes swollen shut, and the other glowing oddly.  
  
   “You’re… free?” Confused, Wynonna let herself feel relieved anyway; because god, he looked shitty, but he was alive.  
  
    “I heard the alarm, and figured...well, hoped… Jumped my personal guard, and _did you start a fire on a government compound?_ ” Dolls smiled, cuts on his lips burning, and he was still a few steps from her. Limping to her, he wrapped one good arm over her, stiffly, fighting a fresh set of shakes. Touching her felt like the first step, the first time he'd breathed regularly since she'd worn that dress all those weeks ago.   
  
    “Sort of.” Wynonna mumbled into his shoulder, blinking tears from her eyes. “If you thought you were gonna leave me with all the paperwork of Bobo’s party, you’re sorely mistaken. I haven’t filled out a form since the day you left. Of course, that was partly due to my baby sister being possessed by evil, but mostly cause I wanted to let you have all the papercuts.” With a hard sniffle, Wynonna pulled back, looking up at his one glowing eye.  
  
    “I’ll explain later, we should keep moving.” Dolls still gripped her shoulder, leaning on her for support, and to reassure himself that she really was there- it wasn't just another delusion, another half-dream he'd wake up from. She'd come for him, really and truly, guns blazing and mouth smart, and smile ever uncertain.  
  
   “Yeah, sure, give orders mid-prison-break,” Wynonna teased, and pushed her voice over it’s cracks. Helping him back up the stairs, Wynonna couldn’t believe this was going to work. They were going to be okay, everything was going _almost_ according to plan…  
  
    “Just where do you think you’re taking my prisoner?” Mercado pointed her gun at Wynonna’s back, and waited for her and Dolls to turn around.  
  
   With a sigh that sounded like a swear, Wynonna and Dolls turned around. _Almost free_ , Wynonna thought, mentally checking just how many weapons she brought in with her.


	3. the heir shows her hand

“Deputy Marshall Dolls is no longer wanted for treason; the Black Badge Division cleared his investigation and he’s not your prisoner anymore.” Without a tremble in her voice, Wynonna spoke, chin high. There was a joke about her using the Force in there, but she let it slide; somehow the beige of Mercado’s pantsuit just screamed she rooted for the Empire.   
  
    “On who’s  _ authority?  _ You speak like we’re equals, little girl, when we both know you’re a murdering psychopath who never should’ve been given a badge in the first place.” Mercado spat out, prepared to drag Wynonna herself into a cell by her hair if she had to.    
  
    “If that were true,” Wynonna rolled her eyes, “we really would be  _ equals  _ wouldn’t we?”    
  
    Dolls hissed a laugh, shaking his head. His one open eye scared Mercado, he could see that even with the other eye swollen shut. Out of his cage, the beast threatened her, and Dolls couldn’t feel sorry for it. They'd done everything they could to him short of killing him, and he wasn't about to forget that.   
  
    “You think I’m going to let you  _ walk out _ of here?” A peal of high-pitched laughter escaped Mercado, but neither woman lowered their gun. “You couldn’t have picked a better fool for a deputy, Xavier.”   
  
    Eyes narrowing at Dolls, Mercado knew he could never leave the compound; the second he’d stepped on base, that had been non-negotiable. The Earp girl, too, would have to be taken care of now.    
  
    “You’re probably right about that,” Wynonna grinned, not daring to look at Dolls just then, and then she drew her final weapon. “But you should know, that if anything happens to me, or the reinstated  _ Deputy Marshall _ here, it’s your job shot dead. See, cause I did some thinking since the last time Black Badge Corporate took a ride all the way out to Purgatory- some real soul-search-y shit, you know? Just imagine a cool movie montage where I-”   
  
    “Earp,” Dolls couldn’t hold back a grin, with his thumb sliding across her neck.    
  
    “That. Right there.” Smiling, Wynonna rolled her eyes. “Dolls is my boss,  _ among other things _ , but he is… my boss.  _ You _ are his boss. You make him do shit he doesn’t want to do, for shitty reasons because you’re a shitty person. I knew you wouldn’t  _ want _ to let Dolls go, but if the order came from  _ your _ boss… Well, what could you do then? Hands-fricking-tied, I’d say. And between _us girls,_ your boss is fed up with giving you second chances over Kandahar. You're gonna wanna follow his instructions, which include letting us go, and letting us kill every one of the goddamn Revenants my family's cursed with killing.” With a false wince, Wynonna winked at the woman's grimace.   
  
     Mercado’s gun lowered a bit, as she decided which one of them to shoot first, because the idea that Wynonna Earp, juvenile delinquent, murderer, alcoholic-   
  
    “I know what you’re thinking. How did Wynonna Earp, resident hot mess, emphasis on the hot, get  _ you _ in trouble at work. And you’re right, a year ago I would’ve come here alone, guns drawn, ready to square up and burn the place down, and believe me,  _ believe me _ I’d love to, but sometimes when Dolls starts just blathering on about  _ protocol _ and  _ procedure  _ and  _ listen to this chain of command, Wynonna _ ,” She imitated, lowering her voice, “I actually listened. By accident, of course. But hey, we’ll leave you alone, you’ve got a ton of shit to deal with. Desk duty can be a real bitch, you know. Nothing like torture or wrongful imprisonment, but I'll say it's a start.”   
  
    Turning a stunned Dolls away, Wynonna put Peacemaker back in her boot, and helped him start to walk away. To start to walk home.    
  
   In a flash, Wynonna heard two shots, and a ricocheted bullet missing it’s target, and a curse from Mercado.   
  
    “By the way, the fastest gunslinger to ever walk the earth is on my six, so you’re gonna wanna watch that trigger finger. Anyways, you know where to find me if you wanna follow up. Seriously, call into your office I’m sure Silverstein’s left you a  _ screaming _ voicemail, I mean just a _  rager _ , you’re gonna wanna get that, he seemed like a real impatient man. ” With a final wave behind her with her middle finger, Wynonna helped Dolls to the car, and  _ almost free _ became  _ going home.  _


	4. home, sweet, homestead

  “Hey.” Dolls approached with caution, eyeing the mug in her hands, and the gun on table. Two days later, he’d slept nearly fourteen hours straight, once they’d got back to the Homestead.  
  
    “Hey, yourself.” Wynonna looked up, taking her feet off the kitchen chair across from her. “You still look a little death-warmed-up, you know that, right? What the hell did they do to you?” As soon as they’d reached the car, Doc gave Dolls a shot of something sketchy and blue, and Dolls’ eye went back to it’s muddy brown. Some of the cuts on his face and hands had started to heal too, but the bruises still looked bad; he still looked thin, starved.  
  
    “You know, nothing less than five stars for people accused of treason.” Sinking down into the chair across from her, Dolls winced at even at that movement. “Your futon sucks, by the way.”  
  
    “I offered you the guest bedroom,” Wynonna said, defensively, before shrugging, “because yes, the futon has a personal vendetta against backs. It mucho hates them. I mentioned that, when I offered you the guest bed.”  
  
    “I wanted _your_ bed,” Dolls confessed, banking on his ability to blame openness on weeks of starvation and exhaustion, “what kind of person doesn’t have a bed in their own home?” Teasing, Dolls wondered if the tactical position had any weight in her mind. She’d be the first target of a home invasion, or the first line of defense against someone or something coming through the front door. “Thank you… for.. You know...Getting me out of-”  
  
    “I need you, too.” Wynonna finished a conversation that started weeks ago, at Bobo’s party. Before Willa, before Dolls’ arrest, before Waverly’s exorcism… Fact remained fact. She’d missed him everyday he was gone, and she was glad to have him back. “Even if you are like, a _vampire_ , or something,” She laughed.  
  
    “A _vampire_ , really, is that what Doc told you?” Laughing back, Dolls braced himself for a truth he’d never prepared to tell anyone- _anyone_. “Wynonna…”  
  
    “Maybe not a _vampire_ ,” She interrupted,  “ _but_ shit if you were like Wolverine or something you’d have like. Super-healing, so what gives with that? I’ll tell you the _X_ gave me pause, plus you’ve definitely got a whole alter-ego guy-with-a-badge thing going for you.” She cleared her throat, looking deep into her mug. “If you’re not ready…” Wynonna met his eyes, unprepared to lose him again after she’d just got him back, she added, “If you’re not ready, you don’t have to tell me, yet. I know what it’s like to have secrets dragged out of you.” Every foster home she’d ever been to knew her past before she got there, she remembered. There wasn’t a square inch of earth she could manage to find to keep her secrets from anyone, not until she got older, got farther away.  
  
    “I’m not gonna hurt you,” Dolls heard himself say, covering his hand with hers on the kitchen table. It felt like something he needed her to know; that even if she thought he was a monster, a _vampire_ , or something worse, he wouldn’t hurt _her._ But she didn’t look afraid of him, she didn’t even pull her hand back. “How _did_ you get my badge back, by the way?”  
  
    “The Bleeker case,” Wynonna cleared her throat, again. “You guys were right, I was there.” She shrugged, with a sigh.  
  
    “You _saw_ the demon that night?” Dolls leaned forward, fingertips touching hers.  
  
    “I fought it. I thought I was you know, cracking up again, _demons_ in _bars_ snacking on people’s heads, I’d.. left that shit in Purgatory, you know? Did my stint in the loony bin and then drank my way to sanity,” Wynonna ignored Dolls’ chuckle, “But, I saw this big, red-eyed looking bastard going after a little girl after it did her dad, you know? Roger Bleeker, you know. I wasn’t… fast enough, you know that, too. She died, Stacy Bleeker. Right next to her dad.”  
  
    The only time she’d seen evil away from Purgatory, and her boots soaked through with blood that night.  
  
    “Jesus, but we solved the murders. You weren’t wanted for questioning on _that._ ” Dolls prompted, just holding her hand then.  
  
   “I know. You guys were looking for the monster, the thing that did it, and I didn’t want to go back to St. Victoria’s,” She shrugged. “You know, Nurse Hetty thought I didn’t get better there, she didn’t think all that electrotherapy taught me anything,” Wynonna laughed, “Taught me to shut my mouth.”  
  
    Dolls felt his throat go tight; six weeks, he’d been beaten, starved, and worse, and he imagined a smaller Wynonna getting shocked, repeatedly, over and over again. It was a wonder she only drank as much as she did.  
  
    “But you… told Silverstein what happened?”  
  
    “Better. I knew where I trapped the thing, and Black Badge did their retrieval gig.” Sipping from her mug, Wynonna let the whiskey burn it’s way down her throat slow.  
  
    “You _trapped_ an abraxas?” Dolls whistled, “And yet you couldn’t negotiate us promotions?”  
  
    Wynonna blinked for a second, “Did you just make a joke?” Her eyebrows raised, surprised.  
  
    “Won’t happen again,” Dolls smiled. “What else did I miss?”  
  
    “Besides me?” Shrugging, Wynonna shook off the bad-feelings that came with remembering her baby sister with eyes gone coal, evil, black. “Waverly got possessed, and we exorcised her without you. She said some _nasty_ stuff about you during it, though.” Smile not quite reaching her eyes, Wynonna shook her head. “About me, too, if it makes you feel better.”  
  
    “It doesn’t, she got _possessed?_ ” With a blink, Dolls processed.  
  
    “Yup,” Wynonna popped her _p._ “How does that square with your knowledge of demonology, _wolfboy?”_  
  
“Not a wolf,” Dolls shook his head.  
  
    “Will you _at least_ tell me if I’m getting warmer?” Leaning close, Wynonna thought about their kiss, at that stupid party. She thought about how much she’d missed him, how angry she’d been at losing him.  
  
    Breaths away from her lips, Dolls wanted to be sensible. He wanted to remind her of all the reasons they couldn’t _be_ , why _they_ wouldn’t work; he didn’t _do_ relationships, he didn’t do _people_ , he just…  
  
    “Warmer than _vampire?_ ” Dolls brought his hand to her chin, cupping her jaw as she leaned into him, gone soft and fragile in a second.  
  
    The world got to see her as the girl with the big ass gun, the girl who’d shot her daddy, the freak who never fit in, and the rebel who’d never really tried. In front of him, Dolls got to see all of those girls, all of them, looking up at him like they loved him, like they were glad to see him, like every one of them needed him. Closing the gap between them, Dolls pressed his lips to Wynonna’s, tenderly, gently, lovingly.  
  
    “Deputy, Marshall, Dolls,” Wynonna whispered, not an ounce of joke in her tone until her smile broke, “that felt like you care.” She teased, for a second, until he kissed her again, harder, like he cared a _lot._ Like he cared enough to scare himself with it, and she kissed back like she was daring him to be afraid.  
  
    “Did that?” He whispered back, already letting her drag him to guest bedroom.  
  
    “Either that, or you’re actually a succubus with weird eyes,” Wynonna laughed against his chest as they hit the bed, leaning across him.  
  
    “You’re freezing cold. Forget what you’ve heard, my sexyness is not supernatural,” He brought his lips to her neck, kissing below her ear and making his way down dangerously close to the neckline of her shirt. “What’d you brag once? _Scary_ good in bed?” Dolls tried to look at her skeptically, but it came off as adoring.  
  
    “Next-time-you-get-sent-to-prison-you’re-just-gonna-be-begging-for-conjugal-visits, scary good in bed.” Wynonna promised, already working on his belt. “And what’d _you_ brag once? Not _that_ little?” She teased, pulling his belt free of his jeans.  
  
    “Wanna see the scar I got from Kandahar?” He pulled his shirt over his head, feeling her warmth against his side.  
  
    “Wanna see the scar I got from the Bleeker case?” Wynonna leaned down to kiss him again, feeling his hands wander up her shirt, touching her skin, _feeling_ her, loving her. Slowly, his fingertips traced down her ribcage, stopping just over her hipbone. “Right there, yeah,” She broke their kiss, “Bastard almost lost a tooth in my skin.”  
  
    Pulling her lips back down to his, Dolls tried to think of reasons they were a bad idea, but he couldn’t even name one.


End file.
